rockitect

I was snooping around the site after an AIA tour of MOCA last week (I need to post pics...) and happened to find a pile of the siding material laying about. Its quite deceiving, as from a distance it looks rather thin (I've had people try to tell me its actually plastic), but if you pick up a piece, its VERY heavy gauge stuff. I was rather amazed, as discussed at length here, it just doesn't look like it from a distance at sidewalk level walking by and its even worse in pictures. While I have a lot of concerns with the actual detailing of the siding and how that will weather over time, the material itself is about as heavy gauge of a metal siding material I've seen. Its heavy, solid stuff. So much so, and I haven't been paid attention, but it probably takes a couple workers to hang one piece of it. Basically, I don't think we have anything to be concerned about the material itself weathering poorly over time. How the (IMO) not so great detailing holds up is another story.

AIA Cleveland is hosting a tour of the new MOCA Cleveland on June 14th. Click the link for more info: http://conta.cc/L18KfI Also, Cleveland Scene posted this: http://www.clevescene.com/scene-and-heard/archives/2012/06/01/a-peek-at-the-new-moca

Right or wrong, I believe the plan is to unveil the new plaza to the public, next weekend, which is the first round of events / festivities for WSM's Centennial Celebration.

I don't know about the other houses, but I know Robert Maschke Architects is designing the house on Random Road. It was on the city design review docket, maybe about six months back. I know the (really good, IMO) architect, Stephen Bucchieri designed a couple houses on Fairview that recently got built. One of the two, I believe he is living in.

Rockitect, now you've inadvertently given up your secret identity! Great pics, thanks for posting. Signed - Someone in your fantasy football league (and who borrows your dig. projector all the time) Ha!

How about I just post a link to my flickr? http://www.flickr.com/photos/t_ferringer/sets/72157629665324684/with/7177042218/

SurfOhio, I got a construction tour of the Med Mart and Con Center a few weeks (I should really post pics...), and believe me, when you're inside the Med Mart, it is going to be far from windowless. I think the facade composition is quite deceiving in that extant. As its not a traditional composition, it makes it difficult to read where the windows are in relationship in each floor plane. Every floor will have plenty of natural light. When you're in it, there is not doubt that the spaces are going to be filled with natural light. And the giant entrance atrium is going to be a truly great space, that is going to be awash in huge amounts of natural light. I think people are going to be quite surprised by it. It is very impressive to just stand in the shell of it. Theoretically, I think the building could have other uses down the road if this Med Mart thing doesn't pan out (and I'm talking 20-30 years if not more, down the road)

Glazing is close to being installed in the entrance to MOCA:

lafont, CWRU does this every year while students are moving in and out of their dorms. I'd assume they work with UCI and the city and they are getting all of the proper permits to be allowed to do it. I'll check today, but it should only be temporary. I work in University Circle and they've done it for the four years I've been working in UC, at the beginning and end of the school year. I don't think its anything to get worried about.

I work right on the stretch of Euclid you'd be traveling between. You'd have no concerns during the day. In the evening I would describe it as generally safe. Things certainly do happen. I would suggest that using a bike to commute (even just the couple blocks from UC to where those apartments are) would be much safer then walking in the evening. I'm intrigued to see what happens with the Circle East apartments. It is possible they could reduce crime and help make the western edge of East Cleveland much safer. Its also possible they could attract crime, because they would be a bit of a target.

Yea, that is what I am saying. What everyone is seeing at the moment is the inner layer of the rain screen. There is another final layer which will be reflective and black, like the renderings, going up over that.

It is Rimex obesdian black seen in the official renderings of the project. I was a part of an AIA Cleveland tour of the project site a few weeks ago and someone asked about the cladding system. It is what is commonly referred to as a rain screen system (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rainscreen_cladding), which in a really dumb terms, means it is multiple layers of skin. What is up currently is only the inner layer of the rain screen. For construction purposes, they installed the outer shell and roof first so as to get the shell of the building enclosed before the weather turns for the winter. While the project visually appears to be moving fairly fast, its not as far as many seem to think. Normally, the interior floors and such would be completed before any exterior skin is installed (say how Uptown is being built, which is also a much different construction process, being a concrete flat plate frame), but because of weather concerns, the inner shell of the rainscreen took priority so that they have some level of climate control of the interior for construction during the winter months.

Lafont, it has begun, techincally. Its a multi-phase project. The first phase, which was renovation of the interior of the McCullough building and restoration of the building's exterior (repointing of brick, new windows) was completed in the past year. The final phase, the addition to McCullough, has yet to begin. The last rumor I had heard regarding it, was that the new director at CIA had the architects re-design the addition for a third time (counting the orginal MVRDV design, then the first Burt-Hill re-design), as he did not care for it. I believe the large pop-art style banners are being gutted from the project, along with other changes. All of this is just a rumor I heard, though.

Get ready... AIA Cleveland 2011 Architecture + Design Month starts this Friday, April 1st! 6:00PM: Start your evening at 1point618 gallery at 6415 Detroit Ave and check out the winning projects from the d3 Housing Tomorrow competition, an international competition searching for innovative housing solutions. 8:00PM: Finish your evening at the opening reception and party for Architecture + Design Month at the Battery Park Powerhouse! On view will be research artist Julia Christensen's exhibit, Surplus Rising, investigating the question 'What happens to the stuff of economic collapse?'. Also on view will be winning projects from the 2010 AIA Ohio and AIA Cleveland Design Awards. In addition, we will be featuring furniture from local designers Objetii, Bauhaus Builders and Bomb Factory Furniture in lounge areas throughout the space. Music will be provided by the skilled Peter Pleasurecruise. Donation at the door. Be there, nerds! We also have a jam packed day on April 2nd as well, including: 11:00AM: CWRU Weatherhead School of Management Building Tour Rare chance for the public to tour Frank Gehry's Weatherhead School of Management building! 12:30PM: A Constructive Madness: http://www.aconstructivemadness.com/ A film by local filmmaker Tom Ball about Peter B. Lewis and Frank Gehry spending a lot years, a lot of time and a lot of money not building a house in suburban Cleveland. The film was written by noted architecture critic Jeff Kipnis. 2:30 - 6:00PM: For the Birds: Birdhouse Design Charrette Cleveland Botanical Gardens For more info click here: http://bit.ly/f5PKJG 6:00 - 8:00PM: AIGA Panel Discussion: Get Creative! Exploring the Creative Process with AIGA CLE Design Competition Judges Panel discussion focusing on the creative process with AIGA CLE Design Competition judges, Andy Epstein, Diti Katona, and Stefan Mumaw sharing their perspectives on creativity. For more info click here: http://www.cleveland.aiga.org/events/2011/04/59197769/ All events are subject to change. And some will. All events are open to the public unless otherwise noted. After this weekend's opening events, we will update this page to include event listings for the rest of the month. If you're curious what else we have planned, click here: http://bit.ly/fqmg8C

There is a facilities manager / building custodian that is on site, I believe most days from 9-5, generally overseeing the building. They were using it a for a couple weeks, a few weeks ago, as a shooting location for that movie Free Runner that was filming in town. There was a lot of equipment / people around the complex then. I also know, and this was before everyone in county government got arrested, that developers interested in buying the building and their respective teams where going in to view the complex in person as part of putting together proposals. Given everything that is going on at the county level, I would assume there will be no movement on anyone buying it until the new administration is in place. Who knows though, given the current state of things.

I'm going to assume (and hope) that is just a massing model.

Spend more money and do it right. Honestly. These are dorms... the profit / payback period is over a much longer period... there is no excuse in my mind. None. Its just laziness / lack of foresight / universities buying the developer's B.S. CSU hired the wrong team for this project. They went for money over innovation, and that is sad. Collectively, we need to have higher standards for these types of projects. Just because they are doing dense urban development, doesn't mean that alone is good enough. If you're happy just get anything, that is what you're going to get. Anything. Its not like this is a condo project in a depressed market, where you have to make your profit in your sales, or else, and you're assuming you have to make profit on only selling 1/2-3/4 of the units and anything beyond that is butter and you may not even do that... (Ahem, Avenue District). Could we please quite using vinyl as the nomenclature. The CSU dorms are not vinyl. Its just siding. They never would have let vinyl through. I hope. Composite can be fine, when used appropriately. This was not the situation. Lots of colleges are going this route, but they also aren't colleges that are urban campuses doing infill projects. They are campuses doing what amounts to are suburban style condo / apartment buildings. Which are horrible in their own right. I went to Kent State, and I think the Centennial dorms they did are an abomination. They used so much vinyl in the finishes, the dorms were still releasing off gases 3-4 years after opening when you were inside. Personally, they look more like a Motel 6 someplace like Streetsboro. All they need is huge fake roofs. As far as I know, the entire dorms are going to be covered in the siding. If my memory is correct, they might be using some brick near Euclid. Re: Gordon Square bustops. I'll answer you in the right forum. My answer is too long.

I throw up a little in my mouth every time I bike down the Euclid Corridor to work past those dorms. I bike to work everyday. The siding, no matter what it is made of, whether it be hardee board, vinyl, fairy dust or another composite material, is completely inappropriate. The architect, Weber Murphy Fox, should have known better. To move the argument from the subjective to something a little more objective, it made me realize there is, I believe, no example of siding on anything within the confines of downtown Cleveland inside the loop created by the Inner Belt trench. Mainly this is because there is not one single family house within the downtown area, as defined by the trench (this is not a complaint or problem, fyi). Its just out of place. An architect worth their fee would pick up on something like this. Aesthetics, while generally subjective, do have objective qualities. This falls under that category. Its great that CSU is building dorms. Its great they are going for something high density. Its great they are doing it on the site they are doing it on. That does not mean they have not made some egregious mistakes with the commissioning and management of this project. At least they've given another architect a good renovation gig in a generation to fix it, as that siding isn't exactly a 100 year material. And the builder, Marous, doesn't have a good reputation around town for their quality control. That is also worrisome. Is it better then say, if they used eifs? Maybe... I don't know. If you're just going to build without much of a thought for design, as evidenced by these dorms, at least use brick. At least then you're showing you have some sensitivity to context. I agree with others, this is very concerning precedent given CSU's ambitious expansion plans. Once one hack has done it, its tough to stop others. Most colleges have relatively strict regulations in regards to what materials can and cannot be used on their campus buildings. It seems apparent that given CSU's lack of experience in new building and student housing that no such regulations exist. Anyone else know?

They also want to make as much money as they can per screen per showing. Unfortunately, indie flicks do not generally do that. I have gone to a couple CIA cinematheque film nights that they have had there. The first film I saw there was hardly anyone in attendance. The second time I went the film sold out and there were so many people there that didn't get in, they had an impromptu second screening of the movie. I've now gone to theatre multiple times for numerous movies / events and have been generally impressed. I think the digital projection is really nice. I have sat in every theatre and have no real complaints about any of them. I mainly go to movies at the cinematheque and cedar lee, so my expectations aren't quite as high as maybe someone used to megaplex theatres. That being said, there are multiple craftsmanship issues I've seen with the project's contractors. Probably the best example is that Marous put a sprinkler head in the middle of the die-cast letters for the sign in the lobby... that says 'Marous Brothers Lobby' or something of that nature. I think it looks really bad, but its probably something most people don't / won't ever notice. Unfortunately, the curse of being a designer is ALWAYS noticing that type of crap. Re: Tower City I've gone to a lot of movies there at the film festival and also end up going there a couple times throughout the year. I've never had a real problem there. I don't think the kids there are any worse then anything I've encountered at any suburban megaplex. I think if TC was that much of a hell hole, the film fest would go somewhere else. There are a lot of people that come to CIFF from out of town, and given CIFF's reputation, I don't think they'd have it if everyone that came thought the venue was a dump.

I have a sneaking suspicion that the form of the building hasn't changed much from those renderings that leaked, but that the skin of it is quite different. Previously, I'd best describe it as a piece of gold bling. I could be totally wrong about that though. My understanding of the FOA split is that Farshid Moussavi and Alejandro Zaera-Polo are splitting their office and projects, effectively in half with each of the projects that each was running in the office going with them. The architecture rumor mill is that they were operating independently of each other in recent years anyway. As far as I know MOCA has always been Moussavi's project, with Zaera-Polo not really involved in the design. For those that don't know, the FOA office is splitting because they were married and are getting divorced.

It's not that easy. I've worked on multiple projects trying to move infrastructure. Its just not that easy. That is the showstopper. The infrastructure under Public Square is a group of incredibly dense and complex interconnected systems. Its not just a matter of moving a sewer line or two, which is difficult enough in and of itself. Think about it this way. If building a new level on top of the existing public square is expensive, then tunneling the roads must be really really expensive. Anyone that has any questions / thoughts concerns could always bounce over to CUDC's blog and just ask them directly. They'll all good people and would probably answer your questions / concerns pretty quickly and throughly. They won't bite. Actually, they'd probably enjoy the feedback. They are the ones working on the project after all.

If anyone is interested, CUDC just posted some more information regarding the Public Square project on their blog: http://www.cudc.kent.edu/blog/?p=1132

Haha. And everyone is still forgetting!

I think everyone is forgetting that there is a massive amount of support infrastructure that runs just underneath all of streets under Public Square. Remember the sink hole at Superior and Ontario a couple years ago... Sewer lines aren't something you just drop another 20' into the ground and still have the system function. Remember also, much of the massive cost of the Euclid Corridor was associated more with the rebuilding of the infrastructure under the street, not so much the street itself. Its too obvious of an idea for those associated with Public Square not to have studied. Just because no one has released a scheme showing it, doesn't mean it wasn't thought about it, looked at, then later disregard before it ever made its way out to the public. The idea certainly has enough merit to bring up at a public meeting for the project, if there ever are any, just to be certain of that. I don't think its so much that the cost of dropping the street that makes it prohibitive, its the moving / relocating of everything that runs under the streets.

Apologies ahead of time, if that got off-topic.